Remember the Dead Palestinian Baby? Turns Out She Didn’t Die from Israeli Fire

Timed to coincide with the Nakba, or “catastrophe,” of the anniversary of modern Israel’s founding — as well as the opening of the U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem — Hamas incited protests and violent riots near the security fence that separates Gaza from Israel.

The liberal media wailed and moaned about the dozens of dead — many of whom were Hamas terrorists — and thousands wounded from Israeli counter-protest gunfire and tear gas.

As evidence of the cruelty of Israeli security forces toward innocent Palestinians in Gaza, the media focused on a dead Palestinian baby. The infant’s tragic death, however, turned into a propaganda win for the terrorist organization.

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A prime example of what could easily have been written by the Hamas propaganda department itself was an article in the Los Angeles Times which lamented the death of the 10-month-old baby girl — Layla Ghandour.

But a former journalist for the L.A. and New York Times astutely noted that, buried midway through the blatant piece, it was revealed by a doctor in Gaza that the baby had died from a pre-existing heart condition.

The 16th paragraph of that report read: “A doctor at the hospital where Layla was treated said she had a preexisting heart condition that caused her death. He asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to discuss the child’s medical history.”

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Left unstated is that he probably didn’t want to be identified so he could avoid suffering the wrath of Hamas for undermining their propaganda victory with the liberal American media.

The preceding paragraph even cited Israeli military spokesman Ofir Gendelman, who stated without elaboration, “We have evidence casting doubt on the truthfulness of reports about the death of a baby girl in the Gaza Strip.”

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Nevertheless, even as the family acknowledged the pre-existing heart condition, they still blamed Israeli tear gas for the little girl’s death.

Even if that were the case, blame would appear to fall on the shoulders of the girl’s 12-year-old uncle Ammar, who was charged with watching the baby at home while the protests at the border took place. Still, he carried the baby there and proceeded all the way forward to the security barrier.

Several paragraphs later in that same article, it was noted that the dead baby’s mother and father had lost a baby boy just a year ago to the exact same heart condition, due to the fact that the father couldn’t afford or obtain the proper medication to treat the condition.

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On a related note which reveals the sort of pure whitewashing propaganda this article was, the girl’s father was described as being unemployed after he lost his job smuggling “food, medicine, weapons, fuel and other goods” through the illicit tunnels that connected Gaza with Egypt, prior to the Egyptians shutting those tunnels down.

The girl’s mother was said to live with her grandmother and at least 12 other family members who all subsisted off a stipend provided by the Palestinian Authority because two of the grandmother’s sons had “died in previous hostilities” with Israel.

In all likelihood, that means those two men were members of Hamas or another terrorist group who had been killed while committing a terrorist act.

Hamas and their allies in the liberal media thought they could use this dead baby as a propaganda coup against Israel, but the truth surrounding the baby’s unfortunate death reveals the Israelis were not to blame.

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Considering the false narratives and blatant lies that have been promoted by the media in regard to the Hamas-instigated conflict at the Gaza/Israel border, it is no wonder that the media has lost so much credibility among the American people.

Ben Marquis lives in Little Rock, Arkansas. He reads voraciously and writes about the news of the day from a conservative-libertarian perspective. He is an advocate for Constitutional government and a staunch defender of the Second Amendment, which protects the rest of our natural rights.